


The Shards of a Whole

by Magnolie



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst and Feels, Domestic, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Uptown Life, it's quiet uptown
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-19
Updated: 2017-08-19
Packaged: 2018-12-17 07:39:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11846997
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Magnolie/pseuds/Magnolie
Summary: After Philip's funeral, Angelica temporarily moves in with her sister and brother-in-law to comfort and recosile them.





	The Shards of a Whole

**Author's Note:**

> Okay first of all: I had to obliterate the other Hamilton children from this story, just because that simply isn't the focus. If you are looking for an Alex/Eliza reconsiliation fic - you are wrong here. This is a story about two grieving people that grow apart in their mourning, opening doors that were shut before. This is very Alex/Angelica centered and pretty much based on the song "It's Quiet Uptown". This is also very bitter-sweet, but I hope you'll enjoy it nevertheless! :)

 

**The Shards of a Whole**

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

How easily one week passes, and then another and then another.

The funeral is held on such a sunny day, the wrong day for the burial of a young man who had his whole life ahead of himself. The entire Schuyler family gathers around the grave, with them the Churches, the Van Rensselaers, and dozens of members of the government, Senators, the Vice-President and his wife, there even are two camera teams filming the scene from afar. They’ll all be on the evening news as it seems: _Son of Secretary of Treasury Alexander Hamilton and wife Elizabeth buried near New York City this morning – Funeral was well visited by party-members – 19-year-old Philip Hamilton was killed in a brawl over his father’s policies last week._ In Angelica’s head the future news-lines can’t stop running as she spots the teams on the far end of the cemetery.

“Church, will you go over and tell them to stop filming?” She whispers to her husband while the vicar recites form the scripture and the coffin is lowered into the grave.

“Why don’t you go?” He responds.

“I am trying to keep the mother of my nephew from jumping into the grave with him,” she hisses angrily, thankfully, Eliza is crying so loud on Peggy’s shoulder, she can’t hear her.

John rolls his eyes, but begins to walk towards the gates. He leaves a gap between her and Alexander, whom Eliza has banished from her side, whom she pushes away every time he tries to comfort her, but – to be fair – lets himself be pushed away. He slowly closes the gap until he stands next to his sister-in-law. She looks up to him, but his red eyes won’t even see her.

After the burial, a portion of the funeral party joins them for coffee at the country home. Eliza is still so unable to speak, or even make eye-contact, Angelica and Peggy host the wake, thank the guests for their condolences and accept flowers for her. Many ask for Alexander, say that they would like to express their grief to him in person, but he is nowhere to be found until Angelica sees him standing in the fields behind the house, starring at the landscape that stretches on and on.  
She contemplates walking down to him, but is called inside again to see off her parents.

In the early hours of the evening, the house has finally emptied out and Angelica is finally able to catch a breath. Eliza has since lied down on the couch in the winter garden, eyes red and cheeks puffy. Church and Peggy are the only ones left by then, smoking something outside the winter garden that suspiciously smells like weed as Angelica joins them, rolling her sore and heavy shoulders.   

“Angelica, are we getting out of here? I wanna be home before it’s dark,” John asks, handing the _cigarette_ to Peggy.

“I thought we were staying here,” Angelica answers, with a disapproving look at the weed.

“No, c’mon, there is nothing left to do here and I am not sharing that tiny guest-bed again. Besides, we need to take Peggs home,” he complains.

Angelica scratches the back of her head and pushes her shoulders back in an attempt to cure the pain. She is no mood for a fight.

“Why don’t you take her home then, I’ll stay here and sort a ride out tomorrow.”

She can see that her husband isn’t a fan of the plan, but there is no way she is leaving them to their own devices now.

“Maybe that’s a good idea,” Peggy offers, “I am sure Ange can help to sort some stuff out.”

John throws what is left of cigarette into one of the flower pots and huffs, but he doesn’t object anymore. He doesn’t like to be around the Hamiltons. He likes Peggy’s part of the family far better, plays golf with her husband. But then, Stephen isn’t the Schuyler-spouse that texts John’s wife on a daily basis and sends old-fashioned letters across the ocean – sometimes three a week.

Angelica watches them drive away in the car and waits outside until the rear-lights disappear in the distance. The house is in complete disarray, she needs to have a cleaner come over the next day. And she needs to send one to the town-house as well. But first she needs to get them both into bed, preferably the same one. She isn’t sure if he has moved back into the bedroom before Philip’s death, nor whether her sister is going to share it with him now.

“Eliza?” She caresses her sister’s cheek, “Eliza let’s get you into bed.”

“I can’t move,” she whimpers.

“Yes, yes you can. And I promise you won’t need to do anything else tonight, we just need you to get into your bed upstairs.”

It takes her sisters a few minutes, but then she finally moves and sits up.  
They slowly make their way up the stairs and into the big bedroom. Alexander is still nowhere to be found. Eliza doesn’t change, she simply lets herself fall unto the bed and pulls up a thin sheet, facing away from Angelica.

“Get some sleep,” she says before she leaves the room.

Her brother-in-law is a harder nut to crack entirely. She finds him in the meadows, sitting down near a group of apple trees. Angelica takes a seat next to him, looking over the fields, recognizing the city lights far, far away from them.

“The mosquitos are gonna kill you if you keep sitting here for much longer.”

He doesn’t respond. It makes her heart crack.

“Is there anything I can do at all?” She tries, putting her hand on his arm.

He looks down at her hand, fighting the urge to take it.

“Alright,” she summarizes after a while that could easily have been another hour and gets up, cleaning the grass and drift from her trousers, “I am going to bed now. Eliza is already asleep. If you need anything, come and talk to me.”

No response.

She lets out a sigh and makes her way up to the house again. She later hears him climb the stairs. But instead of turning right and entering the bedroom, he walks on into his study and closes the door.

They continue sleeping in separate rooms for the following days. Eliza is inconsolable, barely eats and ignores every kind gesture of Alexander’s – no matter how little or big. When he is not around, he walks the fields and hills surrounding the house. Some days he walks all the way to the outskirts of the city and back without his cellphone or leaving a note. One day, Angelica even catches him in the winter garden with a bible, praying. It breaks her heart anew. She can’t bear to see them like that. No matter what he has done, it should all be forgiven now that Philip is gone. It takes her a while to realize that what she is asking from her sister, she cannot even fulfill herself. Her stomach still twitches when she thinks of _that woman_. She finds a letter of her among the condolence cards, rips it apart and burns it in the fireplace one evening.

Her husband keeps urging her to come home soon. He wants to book a flight home, he has his business there to attend to, but the mere thought of crossing the Atlantic one more time makes her sick. She has only just arrived back home. She doesn’t want to leave again. Inside, she feels like she is using her nephew’s death as an excuse to be close to his father. But even if it’s just small conversations (a little more every day), she relishes in every word she gets to exchange with him, every little touch, every moment he looks like he is doing a little better. And she feels horrible about it. When he should be spending time consoling his wife, he sits in front of the fireplace with her, reading and writing. She can feel how he slowly grows very comfortable around her, its only human, and she can understand that he must feel defeated by her sister’s grief and mourning. But as much as she enjoys it, she knows she cannot be his solution.

So she withdraws herself. The next morning, she rises with the sun and takes the car down into the city, leaving them to their own devices. She meets the cleaner at the brownstone and opens the door to her. The place looks abandoned, chaos in almost every room upstairs. Alexander’s office is the worst. The desk is wiped, everything that had once stood on it on the floor – on, under, and next to piles of books, clothes, and boxes while dust dances in the pale sunlight that permeates the closed curtains. She tidies it all up by herself while the cleaner takes care of the downstairs-rooms and the master bedroom. Angelica washes and sorts through the mail, packing a small box of belongings she believes could be needed uptown. It’s late afternoon already when she pays her helper and locks the door again.

She picks up groceries on her way uptown and stops at a diner for fries and a milkshake. When she leaves, rain is pouring out of a grey, gloomy sky and her hair gets all wet and in disarray. She doesn’t arrive back at the house until past dinnertime. From afar she can see that the study is still lit, but the rest of the rooms are dark. She parks right at the entrance and runs for her trunk to get the box of gatherings into the house as reasonably dry as possible. At the door, she fumbles for her key, her hands are wet and cold from the rain, but before she can even begin to unlock it, the door is torn open, and behind it a bewildered Alexander, hair in complete disarray and an angry face.

“Where on earth were you?” he yells at her, “You were gone all day!”

At first, she can’t believe his words. Here she is, drenched and shivering, all for him. So he can have his books and pens and pictures and what not. She hasn’t seen him this angry in eternity.

“Calm down, I’m a free human, I can go wherever I please,” she fires back at him.

“You can’t just leave without a word, I don’t understand you, why do you always-“ he stops and takes a breath, “I – _WE_ were worried!”

“Oh, so you’ve spoken?” She pushes past him into the house and puts down the box before she runs out again to get her bags of groceries.

“We speak all the time!” He claims, but all he gets from her is a doubtful look.

“I went to town to clean your house and bring you some of your stuff,” she gestures at the box, “I washed your clothes and bought groceries so you can hole up here a bit longer. And now I am going to cook dinner for you!”

He doesn’t respond.

“If you keep being like this, I won’t come back next time,” she threatens and disappears in the kitchen.

Anger seethes within him as he watches her ignore him in the hallway. He has worried for her all day, feared she could have gone hiking and could have had an accident. Or worse gone back home to her husband and off to London. Leaving him behind with a woman who won’t speak to him or even grant him a look. He has fought so hard for Eliza’s attention, to make her feel better, to begin working through what lies ahead, but there simply are no words to console her or himself. Half the days he wishes he could trade places with his son, make her smile again. The other half he leans on Angelica, lets the day carry him away on her care and prudence. He couldn’t bear it if she left. He can’t lose her again. He knows it’s unfair. He knows he wants to much, and he is almost scared by what he wants, but he doesn’t care. For the first time since, well, since the media dragged him and his family through the mud, he feels home again. Home, when she hugs him, when she sits with him at night, when she reads what he writes and hums as she looks after them both. Being strong for him. He doesn’t deserve her. He doesn’t deserve either of the sisters. And he feels torn apart in between them.

 

The next morning status quo seems to be reestablished. Eliza is up early, organizing family pictures in the living-room, ignoring her husband, who quickly abandons her in his grief and goes upstairs into his study. When Angelica enters the room with a fresh batch of closing, she finds him sitting at his desk, working. That’s it. She’s not tolerating this any longer.

“You listen to me now Alexander, I need you to go downstairs, find your wife and sit with her. I won’t have this anymore!” She slams the door behind her.

“She doesn’t want me around her,” he complains, putting down his fountain pen and pushing aside his notes, but not looking at his sister-in-law.

“I don’t care. You will sit next to her today, and tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow and the day after that. And you will sit with her for weeks or month, I don’t care. You are not getting through this on your own, neither of you.”

“Ange I-“

She aggressively puts a basket of fresh laundry on his bed.

“No. There is no “I” anymore. You have forfeited every chance at being the least bit egoistic when you went out and,” she swallows before continuing quietly, “betrayed us with that woman.” She can’t even bear looking at him as he turns around in his chair.

“Us?”

“I said _her_ , “she claims and still doesn’t look at him. Instead she opens his drawers and fills them up.

It takes him a while to realize what had in no moment crossed his mind before. He had pained her too. Not just through hurting Eliza, but whatever he and Angelica had harbored for themselves in the years of marriage to her sister – he had betrayed that as well. Suddenly he feels sick again, as if his world would never stop bleeding. He needs to sit down on the bed. At first it’s one tear, and then another and then he is sobbing and shaking silently. Over Philip, over Eliza, and over Angelica.

He doesn’t see her crossing the room, no matter all that has happened, it pains her to see him like this, more than she can endure, even if she is angry and doesn’t regret what she has said. She pushes his legs apart and kneels before him, taking his head into her hands and putting their foreheads together. _Shhhhhh._ She murmurs and kisses his temple while he cries and cries and never seems to stop. Eventually, she makes space on the bed for him to crawl onto, but he pulls her with him and so she holds him tight, arms and legs intertwined with no end and no beginning. She places more kisses on his face and head, carefully caressing him as he lets go. And then her tears start to roll as she thinks of good, honest, sweet Philip and what he would have said seeing his parents like this.

She can’t tell how much time they spend holding on to each other. The sun has already begun to abandon its high stance in the sky when he drowsily opens his eyes and finds her looking at him.

“Don’t leave me alone in this,” he begs her, “please don’t go back to London, I won’t survive this without you.”

She silently nods.

“Promise.” He whispers.

“I promise,” she whispers back and hates herself for how good it feels to hold him. How perfect his hands fit on her waist and his chest on hers. She places one, long, last kiss on his forehead before he catches her lips with his for the fracture of a moment. She wants to lie in this very room for the rest of her life.

She stays the night in his arms. Just after sundown they hear Eliza’s limp and sluggish steps on the stairs. She walks right into the master bedroom and doesn’t even switch on the light. As her door clicks shut the house lays silent in the meadows.

Angelica never knew one could lay with someone for so long and not speak a word or move more than a few inches at a time. There are close to no words exchanged between them as they doze off and wake to the full moon shining through the window every now and then.

Dawn has not yet broken when she leaves him, afraid Eliza might look for him after all and finds him in bed with her sister. Just before she does, she holds his face one more time and whispers: “I need you to be strong for her tomorrow. I need you to make breakfast and strawberry-tea for her and take a walk with her in the garden. I need you to support her in everything she does, I want you to know whatever she wants and needs long before she does, and I want you to provide it.”

He nods.

“Good.”

Slowly she gets up and walks towards the door.

“Angelica?”

She turns around and looks at him. She knows what he is about to say, and she can’t have him do it. Not now. Not ever.

“Angelica, I-“

“I know,” she interrupts him and shows him a tired smile, “I know.”

 

 


End file.
